The second guest post from Brian Carty of Hot Medical News , covering the... well, less-covered side of medicine! Enjoy "the history of the lobotomoy"! There's a great video that goes along with this post. Watch it here . By Brian Carty, MD, MSPH March 25, 2008 Do you remember Rosemary Kennedy, John F. Kennedy's sister? Maybe not, since she spent most of her life hidden away in an institution in the Midwest. She had a lobotomy, a brain operation for mental illness, in 1941 when she was 23. Her father, Joseph Kennedy, arranged the operation. The procedure left her mentally incapacitated. Whether she was mentally ill, mentally retarded, or both, is unclear, but her disruptive behavior led to the operation and its unfortunate outcome. She died of natural causes on January 7, 2005 at the age of 86. The lobotomy, also called leucotomy, was devised in 1935 by the Portuguese neurologist Egas Moniz for the treatment of various psychiatric disorders. In this procedure, holes w...
What's under the gown in the South African Medical Fraternity? Doctors, Surgeons, Practices, Hospitals and the funny, sometimes controversial stories that go with them. Seeeeriouuuus Seeeeesssta!